Isaiah 23
Notes
Transcript
Oracle concerning Tyre & Sidon
Oracle concerning Tyre & Sidon
Good evening my friends....
I hope you have had a great week, it seems that many around us have faced some difficult challenges and issues this week.
And in the midst of their challenges, the church has prayed for them. There my friends is the greatest opportunity for the church to help and bless those around us in need.
Now at times, we are called to do more and we should, But prayer is the front line response as we walk with those around us.
So thank you for praying!
Now we come back to the book of Isaiah and today another oracle, a word of judgment against Tyre and Sidon. These two nations are often considered together due to their close proximity to one another.
This oracle completes a series of ten messages form God, covering the nations of the earth from the east to the west.
These judgments remind us that God is sovereign over all the earth and he will judge the cities and people because of their sin.
We really think the timing of this is about 703 bc, a short time before Sennacherib’s attack on Jerusalem in 701bc.
This also illustrates again, the only one we can place our trust in is the Lord our God. Not even a great sea power like Tyre will be able to help Judah from the threat of other nations, one God can help.
So lets begin to look at them..
1 The oracle concerning Tyre.
Wail, O ships of Tarshish,
for Tyre is laid waste, without house or harbor!
From the land of Cyprus
it is revealed to them.
So it begins with the oracle against Tyre being announced. The word Tyre means rock because part of the city was built on large rocks in the Mediterranean sea. and this little island you will of rock is where part of the city was built, the other half stretched back toward the shore.
The message begins for these great sea faring Phoenician people to wail, to cry out. They have heard for the fall of their home land when they stop in the land of Cyprus to deliver goods.
The house ( the center of the people) is gone and the harbor is no more, of no use might be a better reflection of the sight they will see. The news of this would be devastating to those sailors, wondering what is left, are their families alive not just the city..
Isaiah prophesying about this upcoming loss is a lot for the people to hear...
For example, what is God spoke to us and said the nation we live is fallen, before in a month it will all be gone....
2 Be still, O inhabitants of the coast;
the merchants of Sidon, who cross the sea, have filled you.
3 And on many waters
your revenue was the grain of Shihor,
the harvest of the Nile;
you were the merchant of the nations.
As we open this passage, the rich merchants in Sidon and the coastal islands should mourn and with the sailors.
The merchants are the ones who have given their wealth to these sea fairing men, the Egyptian markets for example have used these sea fairing people to haul their grain to the markets in other lands. They have paid those ships well to do this, thus making them wealthy.
Isaiah is prophesying that all this is coming to end, your prosperity is ending and you will fall.
Could you imagine is our nation collapsed, all that we depend upon physically would stop. You would not be able to buy bread.
4 Be ashamed, O Sidon, for the sea has spoken,
the stronghold of the sea, saying:
“I have neither labored nor given birth,
I have neither reared young men
nor brought up young women.”
5 When the report comes to Egypt,
they will be in anguish over the report about Tyre.
so this brief exhortation calls for the Phoenician people to express their shame and embarrassment because they will lose all their honor and glory, they were once a mighty nation but they have fallen.
When it says I have neither labored not given birth, nor reared any young man.... the destruction of those main cities means that these mother cities will no longer give birth to new cities.
No areas that are even connected to these cities ( think of it like our suburbs- they might have a different name but they are part of the larger city) will not be exempt from this destruction.
Even Egypt will mourn for you, why? They were dependent on them to help export their goods to make them rich.
Now continue that thought with verses 6-7 now
6 Cross over to Tarshish;
wail, O inhabitants of the coast!
7 Is this your exultant city
whose origin is from days of old,
whose feet carried her
to settle far away?
Again people are called to mourn, or wail, for people will have to go far away to find any sort of protection. Yet how will these people from the defeated cities of Tyre and Sidon, will they even be able to find a way to Tarshish to get away?
Many will want to escape, but it will be impossible. Once this city was full of riches, excitement and fun, think of the idea here of a place where sailors would come ashore for wild carousing life...
But it is no more… the cities are devastated and are nothing. It makes me think of what is left of a city in a war zone today. It is in shambles, remnants are all that is left of the buildings and homes, nothing is untouched by the destruction.
8 Who has purposed this
against Tyre, the bestower of crowns,
whose merchants were princes,
whose traders were the honored of the earth?
In this part of the lament, Isaiah raises a rhetorical questions here, it is to help get his Hebrew audience to think of their own situation and to teach them a valuable lesson.
What happens in Tyre is not totally unrelated as to what will happen in Judah.
Although many have opinions as to what went wrong in Tyre, understands many discount what God was doing because of sin.
Was it really this or that....
Isaiah 1–39 (1) Lament over Proud Tyre (23:1–14)
Isaiah challenges the people in Jerusalem to give the real reason Tyre and Sidon will change from an exciting and prosperous commercial center that influenced all the Mediterranean nations to a place of no importance. Was this just a freak accident that is unexplainable, was its defeat due to poor leadership by the king of Tyre, or was the fall of Tyre based on the wise strategy of a cunning Assyrian king? How could a powerful nation that had crowned many kings of small city-states suddenly have this happen to it? How could merchants be treated one day like a prince or famous person and then suddenly be gone? What happened to these proud, wealthy, and powerful people? Someone is responsible for bringing about the dramatic defeat of a nation that for years seemed to have unlimited wealth, power, friends, and trading partners.
Not at all is this just the failure of man, this is the failure of man before God in reality.
Now lets move to verse 9, there is the answer
9 The Lord of hosts has purposed it,
to defile the pompous pride of all glory,
to dishonor all the honored of the earth.
There is your answer, God alone is to be exalted and set apart as holy. Not the things of this world, nor the people in places of power, only God is to be exalted.
The people have dishonored God, they have lifted themselves up in pride seeking what is good for them.
If all peoples rich and poor do not humble themselves in front of God, God will humble them in due time.
Now lets look at verses 10-12
10 Cross over your land like the Nile,
O daughter of Tarshish;
there is no restraint anymore.
11 He has stretched out his hand over the sea;
he has shaken the kingdoms;
the Lord has given command concerning Canaan
to destroy its strongholds.
12 And he said:
“You will no more exult,
O oppressed virgin daughter of Sidon;
arise, cross over to Cyprus,
even there you will have no rest.”
Verse 10 is a little hard to understand in light of the whole passage.
The people flooding over the land of the Nile is like an image of people flooding over an area, like what is happening at times at our Southern border.
But what does this mean? It has the idea that people (Merchants of the fallen cities of Type and Sidon) need to leave the cities and come back to the simpler farming communities and life and be at peace. In these farming communities they could make a living again.
The nations themselves are defenseless against the outstretched hand of God.
There is no hope of relief from Cyprus or any other place, there is no way to escape the judgment that as come upon the land.
No rest for the wicked....
13 Behold the land of the Chaldeans! This is the people that was not; Assyria destined it for wild beasts. They erected their siege towers, they stripped her palaces bare, they made her a ruin.
If anyone doubts the power of God’s hand or his ability to fulfill his plan, Isaiah offers one final proof of God’s word.
Some of those past prophesies of Babylon have already happened, so it is foolish to wonder if what God has planned will come to be..
If God can tear babylon down, that mighty nation, can bring us to them as well.
Now verse 14 Isa 23:14
14 Wail, O ships of Tarshish,
for your stronghold is laid waste.
This word ends with the same exhortation that was at the beginning of the chapter, the sailors of the ships of Tarshish should wail because God will destroy Tyre. The great fortress of the sea is gone.
Now in verses 15-18, there is a word of restoration after 70 years...
Look at these three verses Isa 23:15-18
15 In that day Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, like the days of one king. At the end of seventy years, it will happen to Tyre as in the song of the prostitute:
16 “Take a harp;
go about the city,
O forgotten prostitute!
Make sweet melody;
sing many songs,
that you may be remembered.”
17 At the end of seventy years, the Lord will visit Tyre, and she will return to her wages and will prostitute herself with all the kingdoms of the world on the face of the earth. 18 Her merchandise and her wages will be holy to the Lord. It will not be stored or hoarded, but her merchandise will supply abundant food and fine clothing for those who dwell before the Lord.
So this destruction will last for 70 years, and then the Lord will visit Tyre again...
Just as the Egyptians and the Assyrians will one day worship God; so the people of Tyre will one day present holy gifts to the Lord.
Friends, what God is sharing here is that the people of Judah need to trust God. If these nations will one day see the error of their ways and turn to God, Judah needs to recognize this as well.
Once Tyre has fallen, it will be forgotten for a season of 70 years. But God will extend help to them after those 70 years.
This is a great picture of Israel, they will be in captivity in the days to come for 70 years before being able to return to their city.
And look at this, in those days to come, those in Tyre when will return, they will not forget God and will generously support the temple, their wages set apart as holy and used to bless God’s people.
While we do not know when this happened, or perhaps this idea of turning to the Lord is a future look. Yet a day is coming when the nations of the world turn back to God.
We can classify this perhaps during His 1000 year reign.
But the nations will come and go to His city and house to see god and they nations will bring their wealth and offer it to God.
Man, that would be a day, right?
Yes.
